Far From You

56

FOUR MONTHS AGO (SEVENTEEN YEARS OLD)

“Do we have to do this now?” I ask, fiddling with the iPod hookup in my car. “We’re going to be late.”

“I know, I know, I suck,” Mina says as she takes the Old 99 exit. “It’ll be quick. Thirty minutes. Then we’ll go to Amber’s.”

It’s been storming all week, but it’s clear now, and you can see the stars so much better away from the town lights. I think about rolling my window down and sticking my head out, but it’s too cold.

“You still not gonna tell me what this is all about?” I find the play­list marked Sophie and page through the songs.

“Not yet,” Mina trills.

“You and your weird superstitions,” I say, rolling my eyes and grinning.

Mina sticks her tongue out. “They’re not weird. But this is going to be huge. I’m not going to jinx it now, when I’m so close.”

“You’re crazy.”

“Hey, I’m not the one with a shrink on speed dial.”

Silence fills the car. Her mouth twists back and forth.

“Too soon?” she asks.

“No.”

She shoots me a look.

“Okay, maybe a little,” I admit.

“I’m a bitch. I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s okay. It’s the truth. How bitchy can that be?”

“Pretty bitchy.”

I’ve been home from Portland for two weeks. After almost six months with Macy, clawing my way clean and free, I was finally sure enough to come home.

But finding steady footing has been hard. Six months ago, I’d have happily burned any bridges I could for a handful of pills, but now I’ve got the reality of the damage I’ve done—to myself, to Mina, to Trev, to my parents.

Mina and I aren’t the same anymore. There’s a tense undercurrent to all our conversations. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch her watching me, but every time I look at her straight on, she pretends she hasn’t been staring.

I wish she’d just say something. Anything to stop this agonizing push and pull we’ve fallen back into.

Mina’s phone rings. She checks it, sighs, and throws it in her purse. It’s the third time she’s done that in the last twenty minutes.

I raise an eyebrow.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” she says.

“Okay.”

We’re quiet for a while. Songs cycle through the playlist, and Mina drums her fingers against the steering wheel as the headlights cut through the darkness.

“Soph, you know that fight we had last week, when we had dinner with Trev and Kyle?” Mina’s voice is level; she keeps her eyes on the road, but her cheeks blush a steady pink.

“Yes,” I say, and I feel like I’m walking on eggshells and hot coals all at once. Is she really going there?

Mina twists a strand of dark hair around her finger, still not looking at me, even though I’m staring so hard she has to feel it.

“You remember what you said? About choices?”

“I remember,” I say carefully. I’m afraid to say any more.

“We should talk about it.”

“Now?”

She shakes her head. “Not yet. But soon. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“You promise?” She turns away from the road, and I’m startled to see a rare streak of vulnerability in her face.

“I promise.”

She’s got to hear it, how much I mean it.

It’s the first (last, only) promise I break to her.